Leeds band Hadouken! - the band named after a Special "Fireball" Attack in the Street Fighter videogame - recorded both their new EP and their forthcoming second album in Groningen, Holland, with Dutch drum n' bass producers Noisia (Nik Roos, Thijs de Vlieger,and Martijn van Sonderen.)

The process - which took place at Noisia's own studio - involved a lot of travel, with Hadouken!'s James Smith flying out to Holland every other week and staying at a youth hostel across the road from the studio; the rest of Hadouken! joined him towards the end of production for seven days and nights to lay down live instrumentation, writing and recording guitar parts to support the electronic production already in place.

In addition to travel, the sessions also involved a little bit of a gamble - literally.

"We were only there for a week," Hadouken!'s Chris Purcell explains, "the second night, we left James in the studio recording vocals and headed back to Nik's flat for a game of poker. We were led up to their attic to discover a full casino sized poker table - it was ridiculous! Minus a lot of euros later, we staggered back to the hostel. They also took us out to show us the Groningen nightlife - and we ended up being taught how to dance by Nik and Thijs in the middle of a club!"

Perhaps that dancin' found its way into Hadouken!'s new album - their new set is quite different sonically from previous efforts. Their producers apparantly liked the guitar work ("I think Thijs especially was pleased to see some guitars," Purcell says," we had to almost restrain him from making the tracks too metal with lead harmony lines!") - and another notable element are the uber-danceable beats, which Purcell says are a direct result of watching their audiences on their last tour.

"We learned a lot from touring the first album," he says, "not only from performing our tracks and seeing what got people moving, but also from having the opportunity to watch other acts at festivals around the world and seeing what universally got a reaction. We had already decided that we wanted our second album to be built not only for the floor, but also with the live show in mind. The tracks have fewer sections and are more sparse vocally; we wanted to strike a balance between vocal hooks which get the audience singing along and instrumental drops to get people jumping. The emphasis is more on the beats and bass, and you can really hear Noisia's influence in the low end production. The subs really hit you in the face when we play the new tracks live through a full system."

Hadouken! are now road-testing these songs, balancing the next tracks with popular tunes from their first album, and Purcell says they've been "blown away" by the audience reaction so far.

"Ordinarily, it's a little tough playing tracks that people aren't familiar with," he explains, "everyone wants to hear the tunes they know. That hasn't been the case with the tracks we've been playing from the second album so far; one track in particular called "Bombshock" has had such an insane response on the live front that it's become an instant favourite in the live set with everyone in the band."

One thing that is, surprisingly, not a favorite of Purcell's is - wait for it - the legendary band-name-spawning Street Fighter game itself. Could this be the end of his Hadouken! musical career?

"I hate to say it, but I was much more of a Streets of Rage fan in my youth," Purcell laughs, "I think this might be blasphemy... I might get kicked out of the band! I've still got my old Sega Megadrive 2 at home and all of my old cartridges, but no Street Fighter!"

Smith is still a confirmed fan of videogames, though - "James and Alice both have a Nintendo DS and have been known to wirelessly play against each other from their bunks on the bus," Purcell says.

Those bunks got a workout all summer, as the band played a host of summer festival events, and are heading to Tokyo next to serve as opening act for The Prodigy.

"They're a hugely influential act on our sound and we were really honoured to be asked to support at such a big show," Purcell says, "after that we're straight back on tour in the UK, playing events in a bunch of university towns which we're all looking forward to. Hopefully we'll be going over to the States next year; I know we're all keen to go to America to play some shows, so fingers crossed!"